


Rising

by swilmarillion



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Angst, Basically Sauron's thoughts as he crawls out of the wreckage, Brief mentions of blood/gore, War of Wrath
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-10
Updated: 2015-11-10
Packaged: 2018-04-30 22:23:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 739
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5181863
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/swilmarillion/pseuds/swilmarillion
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They might take from him his lord, but they could not take the burden of his loyalty, and those wounds still bled from his very soul. The weight of millennia, after all, cuts deep.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Rising

**Author's Note:**

> Melkor is defeated in the War of Wrath. Sauron crawls out from the wreckage of Angband and lives to fight another day.

Perhaps it is the shock. Perhaps it is the frenzied beating of the drums that still echo within his very bones that threaten to crumble into dust with every halting drag of his feet. Maybe it is the roar of battle-cries still ringing in his ears: the stinging rasp of steel, the tormented screams of the eviscerated, the pounding of a thousand heavy hands upon his door. And yet it may well be the memory, still fresh and burning bright as a brand from the forge fire in his mind, of divine faces, manic with triumphal glee as they tore from him the only living soul he had ever loved.

Tucked in a desolate hollow of forgotten, dripping stone, Sauron had lain for a time that seemed to measure an age, listening to the dull, insistent murmur of his heart as the battle faded to naught above him. He had wanted to melt into the ground, to let his spirit meld with the very fire that fed the mountain below and become nothing, and yet he knew he could not; for even if death were a gift that could be granted him, he knew that the fire of his soul burned now too low to join with anything so bright. And so he had lain on cool, damp rock until the blood of a thousand enemies had hardened on his skin, cracking with each ragged breath he drew through searing, shattered lungs, and he had tried to forget.

Yet even this had proved beyond his reach. They might take from him his lord, but they could not take the burden of his loyalty, and those wounds still bled from his very soul. The weight of millennia, after all, cuts deep.

And so he had crawled from the depths of Angband, slunk from the cool and the dark and silence, and he had emerged into a world he had forgotten, a world of fresh air upon his face, soft grass underfoot, and the light of the sun unspoiled by smoke.

After a thousand lifetimes of darkness, the light burns his tortured irises. Tears flow freely from eyes that have never known them, and he walks on feet that sink into the dust beneath the weight of his own soul. He walks until he fears his bones will shatter like the fragments of his mind, and then he stops, letting tired eyelids slip shut to cover restless, weary eyes as his head tips back. Sunlight spills across his ashen skin and revels in a warmth he knows he will never feel again.

There is wind, here—not the harsh, punishing gales of Angband that hurled boulders from the faces of the mountains, but a gentle breeze, a light touch on his skin that makes him shiver in a way that he cannot quite despise. It reminds him of hands running down his arms, of fingers tracing along his jaw, of lips whispering into the curve of his neck…

But no. Now is not the time for wistful recollection. Now is the time to act. For had he not, in those last desperate moments, been given a last command? Even as the horns blew and the drums beat and the very doors were beat to dust before them, had not his lord laid upon him a final charge? Sauron could see him even still, standing dark and terrible before his throne with a laugh as fey as death upon his lips as he stood to meet his doom. _Go,_ he had said. _Carry on_.

And so Sauron had gone, slipping through the nets of the Valar even as they searched for him. He was nothing if not dutiful, and he had needed only to leave his heart behind to obey.

Now the drums are stilled, and the cries have died, and only the echoes remain, swirling in the tattered remains of the soul of a Maia who knows that only through vengeance will they ever be silenced. There will be, he knows, a time for blood and for war and for death. Yet it is not now; not in this time of sunlight and grass, this time of whispering winds and shattering memories. Now is not the time for bitter wrath. Now is the time for measured cunning.  

Now is the time for obeisance.

Even now he can hear a familiar voice calling his name.

And Eonwë does not call him Abhorred.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on [tumblr!](http://swilmarillion.tumblr.com//)


End file.
